- Spiders. (Though, really, that should be SPIDERS!!!!!!!!)
- Crowds in enclosed spaces. I was at a restaurant about a month ago and freaked out so badly that I started to cry. Usually it takes more than that, but not always.
- Falling from a great height – this includes roller coasters, elevators, and other “safe” methods of falling. Sometimes, it includes looking over the railing at the top of the stairs in my house.
- Videos of sharp or living things going toward people’s eyes or other orifices or through skin, like in the Matrix and several Star Trek movies and many other films.
- When I wake up and Justin is really cold beside me because my first thought is always “Oh, please don’t be dead!” I have in the past shaken him awake to make sure he was okay and then covered him in blankets so he could go back to sleep. (He got grumpy when I did that, so now I try to see if he’s breathing first.)
- Jellyfish. I have never been stung, but I’ve seen it happen to Justin and it didn’t look pleasant. And they’re hard to see! So I worry that I’m going to go face-first into one and get stung in my eyes. I will not swim if there are jellyfish in the water.
- Being in the dark while outside somewhere I don’t know, like stopping on a dark road in the middle of nowhere or walking in the woods. I’m irrationally afraid of urban legends coming true, spiders or other insects crawling all over me, and wild animals with sharp teeth and claws coming to tear me apart.
- Really big waves, which is mostly funny because I’ve never been close to one. The ones we get here are tiny compared to the ones people go surfing on off other coasts. But I have trouble with the ones here sometimes. They knock me around and it makes me panic.
- That TV show about women who are pregnant and don’t know it, who even give birth and don’t realize what’s happening. I mean, can they not tell the difference between their pooper and their hoo-ha? Really?!
- People in mascot costumes or big furry animal/cartoon costumes where I can’t see the face of the person inside. I am apparently not very trusting of people when I can’t see their face.
- Roaches. They’re disgusting. I hate having them in my house. This is why we have dozens of roach traps scattered around the house.
- Getting lost at sea, which, again, is something I’ve never had reason to fear not ever having gone out past sight of the shore before. But I start to worry when I can’t touch the bottom when swimming because I’m afraid of being swept out and unable to get back home again. (I know that it makes no sense. This isn’t at all a list that makes rational sense.)
- Changing plans at the last minute, especially if it involves more than two people and food. I have gotten much better at this over the years, but it used to be really bad. And sometimes, if I’m already stressing out about the situation, this can drive me to tears.
- Wind at night. At its worst, I genuinely fear that the wind is going to sweep through my home taking everything important away from me, including Justin. During the day, I can see things blowing in the wind and if I can “watch” the wind, then I can make sure nothing of mine is blowing away. At night, wind is sneaky and I can’t see what it’s doing.
- Airports. They combine my problems with crowds and my problems with changing plans and then add on the bonus of being scanned and analyzed and potentially losing luggage and the stress of making connecting flights with the delightful interlude of being crammed into a noisy flying sardine can for a couple hours. The flying part doesn’t bother me. It’s all the rest of it.
Posts Tagged ‘lists of things’
Stepping through my day….
Wednesday, August 19th, 2009Inspired by Amy. 
5:25 – Wake up, look at the alarm, and realize that I have 30 minutes more I could be sleeping.
5:55 – Hit the snooze button.
6:00 – Hit the snooze button again.
6:03 – Get out of bed before it goes off again. Ugh.
6:15 – Get out of the shower and start to get ready. Change clothes two times. Go downstairs and make my lunch. Go back upstairs and change clothes again.
6:45 – Kiss Justin good-bye and head out the door.
7:15 – Park my car.
7:25 – Get to my desk and log into the computer.
7:30 – 8:00 – Make and eat my oatmeal while checking my email and scanning documents into the computer that were left from yesterday.
8:00 – 9:00 – Alternate between trying to figure out how to get my macro to work right and doing other projects people ask me to do.
9:00 – 10:00 – Go to a meeting about the changes coming into the system for how we approve documentation. It’s a very boring meeting.
10:00 – 10:30 – Go back to trying to figure out my macro.
10:30 – 11:00 – Help a coworker try to embed an Excel table into a Word document. Fail.
11:00 – Run to the other side of the building to talk with my Lean adviser about my project and other Lean stuff.
11:30 – Eat lunch and read a book at my desk.
12:00 – Call Justin and a few other people.
1:00 – 2:00 – Think about what my Lean adviser said and work on my macro and work on things people give me.
2:00 – Lead a Lean meeting about schedules. It’s a short one just to let everybody know where I think we’re heading. One of the people I really need to be there is out today.
2:15 – Walk through the demo cabin of the new project. It’s beautiful! Follow a coworker as she takes me through another hanger onto another airplane that they’re finishing up the details on. I’ve been at the company for 3 years and I finally got to step foot onto one of our airplanes!!
3:00 -5:00 – Work on the Excel table crossover into Word problem. Get it so it works on my computer, but it doesn’t when anyone else opens it on their own computer. Work on other things people hand me to do. Get utterly frustrated at Word.
5:00 – 6:00 – Really buckle down and try to work out this macro thing. I think I need to set objects and collections and create a loop. Maybe. How do I do that?
6:00 – Leave work.
6:45 – Get home, change quickly, and walk out the door to meet Justin walking home from the grocery store.
7:00 – Walk Justin home and go out to finish my walk. Get home, shower, clean house.
8:30 – Start to make dinner with Justin.
9:00 – Eat dinner and clean the kitchen. Go back upstairs. Read comics and blogs and listen to Do You Want to Date My Avatar two more times.
10:30 – Write this. And go to bed.